As Tintin in the Congo is banned from children's shelves and banished to the
adult section in bookshops, here is a list of racism complaints that have
dogged Hergé's comic series in the past.

1) Tintin in the Congo first hit the headlines in 2007, when Bienvenu Mbutu Mondondo, a Congolese citizen, claimed the book was racist and campaigned to get it pulled from the shelves in Belgium. After a four-year court case, the final ruling in which is expected next year, the publishers insisted the plot was "paternalistic", not racist.

2) In 2007, the UK's Commission for Racial Equality called for the same book to be banned, saying it contained imagery and words of racial prejudice. One of the most controversial scenes shows a Congolese woman bowing before Tintin, saying: "White man very great. White mister is big juju man".

3) The Shooting Star, which tells the story of a race to find a meteorite in the Arctic, has been seen as anti-Semitic for its portrayal of Jews. The original version, published in Le Soir newspaper, led to claims of racism around two Jewish debtors and an American financier called Blumenstein. In the post-war book, the debtors were removed from the story and Blumenstein was renamed Bohlwinkel, from the fictional country of Sao Rico.

4) The first Tintin book, Tintin in the Land of the Soviets, was written as anti-Soviet propaganda. Hergé is said to have sourced the ideology from a single book written in 1928, which blamed communism for mass poverty, famine and terror. The comic has been criticised for its biased portrayal of the regime.

5) Critics have complained that The Blue Lotus, set in China in the early 1930s, is anti-imperialist. The Japanese are portrayed with little sympathy in the book, and Japanese and Western involvement in China is marked with disapproval. However, Hergé also made clear attempts to discourage ignorant or racist remarks about the Chinese.

6) Land of Black Gold, set in Palestine, was rewritten after complaints about the plot, featuring Jewish terrorists led by a Rabbi. After the Holocaust, Hergé's British publishers asked him to replace the terrorists with Arab characters.

7) As well as alleged racism, Tintin in the Congo has come under fire for its graphic portrayal of animal slaughter. Animal welfare campaigners argue that the book reinforces notions of animal cruelty, insensitivity and violence. In one scene, Tintin shoots at an antelope, believing it is still alive after taking a bullet, and finds out that he has killed the entire herd.

8) The lack of women in Hergé's comics has led to allegations of sexism. The only female character of any importance is Bianca Castafiore, who appears in The Calculus Affair, but is portrayed as foolish and unaware of others' reactions to her behaviour. Critics have accused the comics of being misogynistic, a claim Hergé strongly denied.